Talk about the Nurburgring is most welcome here, but mention of specific lap times is verboten.
The thinking that I was led to understand was, that discussing laptimes on this particular board encouraged people to view the Nordschleife Nurburgring as a racetrack rather than a one-way two-lane partially de-restricted toll-road in the German countryside.
I believe this stemmed from the board's original URL at m5.com rather than m5board.com at at time when BMW Europe were getting funny about site content. The decision was to keep the site low-key and squeaky clean as much as possible.
The E34 and BMW have a heavy history with the Nurburgring so every other topic including Touristenfarhten (Public driving days) are well worth mentioning and posting about, but no posting your lap time.
There have been several videos posted in the past of the E34 going around the track. The most famous of the E34 M5 ones is the one with the America guy commenting on various stuff around the track. It is not a particularly great video content-wise if I recall.
Since the ban a couple of years back by the operators of the 'Ring on members of the public recording their laps during public days without a permit, several websites have frowned upon linking to videos of this type. On m5board.com there is no specific blanket ban I am aware of, but I do know that posting videos of accidents and crashes will be removed. The video ban by the operators of the track was to try and prevent the possible scenario of a death being filmed and then widely dispersed on the internet, raising the track's profile to the nay-sayers and do-gooders, possible resulting in a closure of the entire Touristenfahrten idea.
Back in the real word, many video clips are present on the ubiquitous Youtube as well as most enthusiast's websites, especially Subaru's and Mitsubishi Evo's.
If you wish to discuss the Nurburgring times and techniques for improving them in a safe and acceptable manner, you will have to go to a forum where this is permitted. The best two I know would be
www.northloop.co.uk (my choice) and
www.bridgetogantry.com (very famous)
General Nurburgring information is on the very good
www.nurburgring.org site run by Ben Lovejoy.
Finally, have you been to the Nurburgring yet? If there is one subject in the motoring forum world that is subject to hyperbole and mis-information, it is that track and the spoutings of people who have not been.
If you have not been, I promise you that your laptime will be of no consequence whatsoever for at least the first few visits. The sheer spectacle and experience of the track is awesome.
Once you get used to the place you will quickly find that as many people have noted in the last year to two years, the Touristenfarten days at the weekends and summer evenings have been getting ever busier. The common bank holidays in April (Easter normally) and August are so busy now that experienced drivers are now avoiding them, but if a newbie, it is worth going to see the variety of cars on display.
As the numbers of cars have been increasing, the opportunity for a clear lap during the TF slots is increasingly rare. When we went last summer, we had not a single run through the Foxhole un-impeded in three days.
Drivers now tend to discuss the sections of a lap they were pleased with and corners they nailed perfectly, rather than the overall lap time. Driving the track correctly and on the limit with a slower car is vastly far more satisfying than going five-tenths in a supercar.
Err.. I'll shut up now. hmmm
Ivan
